Long Hardship Poems

Long Hardship Poems. Below are the most popular long Hardship by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Hardship poems by poem length and keyword.


The Changing Face of the Media

Every time I look I see a different face,
As the media gathers pace,
In the influencing race.

No longer in the news business,
No longer bothering to clean up their mess,
No longer checking before going to press,
No longer thinking about mases to impress,

With no more mirrors in the place,
For the past to embrace,
It is now all about the modern face,
And it's influence on the race,
With few caring about the hardship investigative reporters face,
If they have too many facts to put in place.

It is only a matter of time before the media will have to face,
Up with a "we misjudged the mood of the public face",
With little chance of another "thanks for the award face",
With every chance of no "poker face",
As they will need a "change of heart face',
Before the music they have to face,
For undue influence on the outcome of the  human race.

Oh how on earth did the media ,
Get such an idea,
That influencers would for them, be there,
When there were so many of us who could see what was living there,
That influencers are masters of what people want to hear,
And are more worried about how they look on air,
And how much money can be made from them being there,
Than how many facts they produce for us to hear.

I wonder how the media will respond to what is here,
How much influence I have to spare,
And how many new faces I will be shown this year.
Form: Burlesque


Premium Member My Love For Trees

Seems to me the more I age
My fondness for trees only grows

Their resilience and gracefulness
Their symmetry and beauty
Their arms outstretched heavenward
As if asking to be blessed with a nest for life

But it’s the way they bravely face each season
No fanfare just day by day
Making the most of their assets

Offered freely to all taking the time to appreciate
Every gnarly curve earned though hardship
Broken branch and injury

Radiant in the sun Solemn by moonlight
Valiant through the rainstorm
Resolute against snow and sleet

Naked… Buds… Foliage… Dried falling leaves
And naked again the cycle regenerates itself
Such is life on this beautiful planet




AP: 1st place 2022, 2nd place 2020, 3rd place 2024, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2022, Honorable Mention 2022

Submitted on August 29, 2018 for contest END AUGUST 2018 STANDARD sponsored by BRIAN STRAND  -  RANKED 1ST

Premium Member Alessandro

Her husband had died bearing arms in a war zone
And left her to raise two boys on her own
It wouldn’t be easy with sweet Alessandro baby
Since relentlessly grueling was life in Italy
The last straw was a brutal earthquake
That left the village with naught but heartache

Mother’s tears were to know one more hardship
As Alessandro was bundled and boarded on a ship
Sent off to be raised by aunt and uncle in America
For a second chance with a new mama and papa

Of course Alessandro cried for his mother till blue
Also for the father he so barely knew
Felt callously abandoned, sadder than some melancholic dove
Would be years till he’d comprehend his mother’s act of love



AP: Honorable Mention 2020
Form: Rhyme

Premium Member The Cowboy Legend

The Cowboy bloke of yesteryear
Would work in mud and dust
He would tackle any hardship
As long as it was just

Out on the range from dawn to dusk
Rarely saddle sore
His butt was tough as leather
From calluses he wore

Had the same thing on his hands
Where red hot rope slid through
His courage part of legend
A guide for me and you

Very rarely got to town
Had a blow out when he did
Imbibing plenty rot gut
Then in the stable hid

Head out to the ranch next day
Full trust in his horse
Swear never go to town again
A short lived thought of course

They were the stuff of legend
But the same applies today
You could never live a better life
Than by the Cowboy way
Form: Ballad

Premium Member Street Garden

Ever pass a street garden
On the lower East Side
You know the kind
Long and narrow
Squeezed between two tenements
Ever wonder how it came to be
Who made it?
Where did it come from?

Odds and ends 
And garden tools clutter one corner
Benches are set aside
A children’s swing waits at the far end
The garden is not magnificent
Like the ones you see in suburbia
But like every garden in the City
It beckons to you with a history of its own
Take a long look
When you peer through the chain link fence
See the rows of growing green things
They didn’t happen by accident.

Grassroots activists fought to stop the decay of the lower East Side
Squatters took over abandoned houses
Theirs were marked by struggle
Hardship 
And violence 
They and kindred spirits captured the activism of the 70’s and 80’s
From Alphabet City
Running along Avenue A to Avenue D
They used terms
Everyone understood
Affordable apartments 
Living spaces.

Neighborhood volunteers
Worked the soil
Hunched over
Hands black with dirt
Digging past bricks, rocks and rubble 
Breaking up the ground
Feeling the moistness of the Earth
In their fingertips
Their whole being 
Sensing the beginnings of new life.
Form: Narrative


Halfway Home

When your heart beats
and mine no longer can, 
I'll be flying into peace 
into heavens open land 

At the coming of dawn 
as night's beauty falls away, 
I'll take one last breath 
looking forward into day 

Gorging on the sight  
as the sun begins to rise,  
I'll remember all of life
through veils of all my sighs 

I'll weep for could have beens 
for the times I failed you all, 
taking on the all sins of life 
a saviours penance is my call

The gentle moments birth 
when your eyes opened wide, 
I felt the purest love of all 
I had held you all close inside 

As first steps began to run 
and falls and tears fell free, 
running with your arms out 
you'd run to mummy, me 

Loving you more than life 
I was probably a little nuts, 
protecting you with all I had 
was finally showing guts 

Then the slide into insanity 
crept up and mauled my mind, 
I hated what I had become 
how could I be "that kind" 

Somehow we made it through 
the mantels of hardship and pain, 
and going onto to live a life 
I hardly could have dreamed 

Given one last wish 
I'd had to think awhile, 
But after little pondering 
I'd ask to see you smile 

Watching you grow old 
isn't in the God's plan, 
my children stay a course 
of the common man 

I'd love to see your children 
watch them walk the earth, 
these babies I'll guard over 
from moments of their birth 

Dont be a little bit sad 
dont think your missing me 
how can you really miss
what's already halfway free
Form: Rhyme

Emma

If there's a good wartime story worth telling and sharing:
this one should be told as it unfolds much sadness,
but amid disaster and hardship, hope was a light flickering
underneath those bomb-blackened, crumbling stones.



During World War II before the Allies landed
in Salerno, the city in Southern Italy,
my uncle was a prisoner of war in England...
an Italian was considered an enemy,
but Emma, the beautiful British woman, didn't see 
it as a barrier and in that camp he treated him as a friend.



Was Emma moved by the pitiful look of a soldier
captured and brought to foggy England,
where the winds were as cold as the murky air;
didn't he dream of his distant motherland?


Needless to say compassion was found in Emma's heart 
and her words brought much tenderness he never forgot,
" Soon this war will end and you'll breathe the crisp air of spring:
when a mockingbird's song will remind you of this far-away friend! "
Form: Rhyme

Premium Member The Last Winter of the Ghost Road

The death winter came and was cold
With white on the purple mountain
The Tiwahe’, the Standing Rock People
Begged for warm fires from Iktinie the Sun Spirit
Our mouths were hungry and bodies were weak

Iya’ the Snow Monster had taken us farther to the south 
To follow Capa the Beaver Spirit
A long journey into early winter’s night
For there was much labor to keep warm in our Thipi’
Our mouths were hungry and bodies were weak

When Iwoblu the Winter Storm whispered his cold story 
To the Aicita, the Ghost Messenger
She tricked Mathohota the Grizzly Spirit with her wailing
To haunt the sky with growling winds

The Wahupakoza escaped on icy feathers
Stirring the winds with their flight of fears
And within the SunOthi’ earth dens, the wolves
Sungmanitu’ howled with their starvation

The stone figured buffalo,Wankan Tanka’s blood was cursed
With ice and their coats were bitten with Heyumka
Mothers were caged in the hard frost, while their calves fell and died
Our mouths were hungry and bodies were weak

Gleska Wowayazan, the spotted sickness, harvested our souls
We were prisoners of Wichat A’ the sickness that takes all
Our boldest warriors, Zuya Whichsa’ were taken from us
To follow the Wanagi’, the spirit of departed human beings
Far to the Milky Way to stand before Hihankara’ the judge of souls

We mourned and chanted for the loss of our children Wasigla’!
And the People of Standing Rock wept AcheyA’ in dreams
Of earth warmth and filled bellies of mothers and children
Our mouths were hungry and bodies were weak

It was the last winter of the ghost road
I am White Buffalo Calf Woman,
I am the keeper of words and I tell you now so that you will know

Edited reposted
April 27, 2022

Theme:  Life
Form: Narrative

In Lament Of The Cowboy

A scant twenty years
grieved a century or more
Poetically perfect
in spirit and lore

A man and his horse
alone on the range
The cattle his instrument
and music to play

Civil War veterans and blacks
from the South
Through dust and dark clouds
even blizzards they mount

Together they battled
in concert they fought
Each unto himself
through prairies uncrossed

The hardship and death
to him worth the price
Pushing always ahead
a stranger to fright

The only thing branded
to be left at the end
Was the legend he gave us
— and the message it sends

(Cowboy Poetry Gathering: Elko Nevada, February, 2017)
Form: Rhyme

Visionary

visionary
God made men 
yet God chose a man 

visionary
God made the world 
so when I walk my 
ways in life I free my 
mind from fears 
yet I fear God 

visionary
God is eternal 
so I don't worry 
when I will die 
cos my reincarnation 
proves Gods eternity

visionary
God is protective
so he never let the innocent
down since its origin
not even now 
so when I walk through 
the valleys of hardship
I sure know it just but 
only for a while 

visionary
God is the light of life 
still I sight the world 
in darkness
living in a bondage
which is not natural
but a nemesis from 
ignorance 
still humans glorify evil 
even in their pains just to
keep  the legacy 
of an evil genius alive
despite the dark reality 
it bleeds to humanity

visionary
no one is perfect
no even a visionary 
yet what is good is good 
and  wisdom is never for 
the ignorant 
so when I walk in my 
ways always
I pray vanity never be end 
at the end of my destination
God help my soul
Form: Epic

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